A Day in the Life of a Sith
by anime aficionado
Summary: We all know the Sith for the most important acts of evil they have committed. But what was just a normal day for them like?
1. Torment

Hello everyone. I've been meaning to do a Star Wars story for some time now, and I'm glad I finally committed something to print. This isn't going to turn into an actual story, although I am considering doing a chapter for each Sith Lord. Enjoy.

Disclaimer: Everything here belongs to George Lucas.

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**Torment**

Palpatine sat on his throne and listened with considerable disinterest to the Head of the Imperial Treasury make a report. Someone had hacked into Imperial accounts and stolen vast amounts of credits, and the Imperial security forces were having no luck tracking them. Pinned in place by the Emperor's penetrating stare, the high-level bureaucrat began to sweat as he informed Palpatine that the hacker had most likely stolen the credits to fund the growing Rebel Alliance.

"Is that all?"

The Head of the Imperial Treasury gulped audibly.

"Yes, my lord."

Twin forks of blue-white lightning flew from Palpatine's fingertips and caught his subordinate square in the chest. The man was propelled off his feet, screaming, and was dead before he impacted the wall.

"It is so difficult to find good help these days," Palpatine mused.

The Sith Master got up from his throne and exited his throne room. As he crossed the threshold, six of the eight Imperial Guards stationed outside of his door took up formation around him. As Palpatine walked through the sprawling Imperial Palace, he sampled the currents of the Force being generated by both his nobles and the galaxy at large.

Palpatine grinned at what he sensed, showing his jagged yellow teeth. He and his guard inspired terror wherever they went, forcing high-ranking politicians to back out of their way. The whole of Imperial Palace was a pitch black void of fear, shot through with reddish undercurrents of hate. The entire galaxy was much the same. The stars themselves were groaning under the weight of their inhabitant's agony. Fear, anger, hatred, ambition; all of the passions that gave a Sith his strength were everywhere. Truly, there had never been a better time to wield the dark side of the Force.

The Emperor took a series of turbolifts deep into the bowels of his palace. He stepped inside of a soundproofed communication chamber set aside in an alcove. His guards waited outside. The interior of the room was perfectly dark, except for the blinking lights of the holocomm unit. Casually, the Emperor used the Force to activate the unit, which automatically sent out a coded signal to the _Executor_. A few minutes later, the figure of a kneeling Darth Vader appeared in the middle of the room.

Palpatine carefully prevented his lip from curling. There was a time when he had thought Vader was perfect, but that time had long since passed. The Emperor seethed with anger when he considered all of the time and effort he had invested in turning Anakin Skywalker into a Sith, only to have him be cut down days after all of his hard work had come to fruition. Vader had once possessed the potential to become the epitome of everything the Sith Order represented, but that dream was long dead. Vader was a burned-out husk of his former self. Still, even a fragment of perfection was not something to be taken lightly. Vader was...adequate.

For now.

"What is thy bidding, my master?" Vader asked.

"There is a Sith technique I wish to impart to you, Lord Vader," Palpatine said.

Vader looked up sharply. "Truly?"

One of the several leashes Palpatine used to keep Vader in line was his mastery of Sith powers. Only rarely did the Emperor give his apprentice some small lesson in the Sith ways. Only a few months ago, Palpatine had taught Vader how to use the Force to see a short distance into the future in order to predict an opponent's moves in battle. For him to give another lesson so soon was unheard of.

"Yes, my apprentice," Palpatine said, drawing the words out to make them hypnotic, "Clear your mind. Fill yourself with the dark side. Only with great concentration will this new power become yours."

Vader was silent for several moments. Palpatine could feel him gathering the Force into himself. It was times like these he remebered why he kept Vader as an apprentice. He gathered power into himself with such ease. If only his wrecked body were able to contain more.

"I am ready, my master," Vader said. Palpatine could almost taste his excitement.

"Good. Now, use your power to..."

A pause.

"Master?"

"Oh, my. I had forgotten."

"Is something wrong, master?"

"I just remembered that this technique uses the same energies as Sith lightning. And you can't use that, can you? How forgetful of me. That will be all, Lord Vader," Palpatine said. With a twitch of the Force, the link between the Emperor and his servant was cut.

Even half a galaxy away, he could feel the white hot corona of Vader's rage.

Palpatine grinned. He loved doing that.

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I hope you liked it. Please review!


	2. Chaos

Here is my next installment. Enjoy.

Disclaimer: The Jedi is the only character I made up. Everything else belongs to George Lucas.

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**Chaos**

Count Dooku stared at the hologram with a mixture of mild amusement and contempt. He was standing on the bridge of a Confederation heavy cruiser. They had dropped out of hyperspace to pick up a Neimoidian officer whose army had been destroyed by the Republic. The incompetent slime had escaped at the last moment on his command shuttle. Considering that he had squandered upwards of ten billion credits, Dooku was surprised that he had the gall to come back. He was too stupid even to bother making a spectacle out of his death, and so Dooku had planned to simply have him shot when he came down the boarding ramp.

However, the person who had exited the shuttle had not been the Neimoidian.

Instead of the revolting slug, a tall humanoid female had walked down the shuttle ramp. She was draped in ornate white robes with cream colored trim that matched the color of her skin. Her silky blonde hair had been tied up in a knot at the top of her head, allowing her pointed ears to show. They were the only thing that marked her as nonhuman.

The battle droids at the foot of the ramp fired the instant she entered their line of sight. The Jedi ignited a deep green lightsaber and rebounded the bolts with a single sweep of her blade, destroying all six of the them in an instant. As more droids poured into the hangar, she calmly waked forward to meet them, her lighsaber forming an emerald wheel of energy in front of her.

Dooku was impressed with her bladework. Although she was definitely using Soresu to deal with the torrents of blasterfire, there was a certain rhythm to her movements, a measured grace to her footwork, that suggested to the Count that she was also highly proficient in Makashi. It made a certain amount of sense, he supposed. A style most well known for its elegance would appeal to a being as lovely as her.

As the Jedi moved into the corridors of the ship, and the rabble of spindly battle droids was supplanted by groups of super battle droids and droidekas, it became apparent that her mastery of the Force was just as great as her mastery of the lightsaber. Droids collapsed into pieces as if invisible hands were removing the screws and bolts that held them together. Many of them stopped abruptly, smoke curling from their processing units, and were knocked aside by their fellows. Shield generators and blaster rifles exploded without warning, and through it all the Jedi continued forward at the same unhurried pace, her blade in constant motion as she redirected incoming fire.

Count Dooku spun on his heel and left the bridge. He walked through the halls of his ship at a leisurely pace, and began to gather power around himself. As he and the Jedi grew closer to each other, Dooku ceased to be Dooku. In the Jedi Temple, he had been taught to surrender himself to the Force, to quell all thought and allow it to guide him. To become a pawn, a tool, of the Force. Now, after being taught by Darth Sidious, Dooku knew the true path to power. The Force no longer ruled Dooku. Dooku ruled the Force.

When the Count could hear blasterfire and the hum of his enemy's lightsaber, he drew his own curved hilt and held it in his right hand. He squeezed the activation plate, bringing his crimson blade to life.

The Jedi sensed him coming. Through a storm of blasterfire and a forest of droids, her eyes met his. Although her face was youthful, her eyes seemed very old, and full of wisdom. She reminded Dooku of someone else, but he could not think of who.

"Stop," the Count said.

Every battle droid ceased fire, and when the Jedi had deflected the last few bolts, a ringing silence fell in the corridor.

"Count Dooku," The Jedi said. Her voice was soft, and very solemn. To Dooku's ears, it even sounded a little sad.

"Greetings, Master Jedi," Dooku said cordially, "May I inquire as to why you are destroying my ship?"

A small smile tugged at the corners of her lips. She really was lovely, Dooku thought.

"It was not my intention to destroy," She replied, "I merely wished to speak with you."

The Count raised his eyebrows. "You could have requested a meeting. There was no need to sneak aboard my ship. I am always open to reasonable conversations, especially from Jedi. But these days, the Jedi are more interested in fighting than talking, I'm afraid."

"The same could be said of you," She said. It was not an accusation, merely a stated fact.

"It is dangerous to lower one's guard in this day and age, I find. Tell me, Master...?"

"I am called Lan."

"Master Lan, what is it you wished to speak of?"

The Jedi looked very tired at the question. Dooku had to resist the impulse to offer her a chair. She was still holding an active lightsaber, after all.

"A few months ago, my cousin was killed. By your underlings, I believe."

"So you have come here to avenge her. Understandable, of course, but this is a time of war. If your cousin was working against my forces, then she made herself a legitimate target."

"I did not come here for vengeance. She would never have wanted that."

Dooku narrowed his eyes. The feeling of familiarity was very strong now.

"Who was your cousin?" He asked.

Lan smiled sadly.

"You knew her as Master Fay."

That made Dooku wince. Of all of the Jedi who had died in the war, Fay was the only one he felt any kind of regret over. In his seven decades as a Jedi, Dooku had met her only once, but she had made a lasting impression. And now that he knew they were related, he could see the resemblance between Fay and Lan. Lan was leaner, and her eyes were green instead of blue, but they were very similar. Dooku couldn't believe that he had failed to make the connection on his own.

"I remember Master Fay," Dooku said, "I regretted her death immensely. But if you do not come here for vengeance, then what do you hope to accomplish here?"

"I came here to save you."

Dooku stiffened.

"What?"

"There was a time not so long ago that you were a great power for good. It is not yet too late for you to return from the shadows and take up the mantle you have cast aside. With your help, this war can end."

"I am sorry, my dear, but no. I cannot in good conscience return to the Jedi. The Republic is a corrupted-"

"That is not the war I was referring to."

In the Force, Dooku could sense Lan reaching out, not to any single individual, but to the Force itself. Dooku knew what she was referring to. Every Jed, every Force sensitive, could feel it. In the galaxy of flesh and blood and stone, armies clashed and painted the stars with blood, but that was merely a reflection of the true war. In the Force, the Light side and the Dark side were fighting like a pair of wolves, one luminous white and one jet black. They tore at each other with claw and fang, and every injury they sustained reflected the deaths of millions in the material world. They howled, and the wails of the bereaved echoed in concert with their calls.

It was beautiful, and it was appalling.

And Dooku, if he wanted to, could end it.

He knew who Sidious was, where he was, what he wished to accomplish. In a handful of sentences, Dooku could bring the whole weight of the Jedi Order crashing down on Sidious' head. He could end it all.

But, he didn't want to.

Dooku felt a moment of loss and sadness as he recognized that the old him, the man who would have sacrificed anything for peace, was truly gone forever.

"I am sorry, Master Lan," Dooku whispered, "It is too late for me."

"Then all that I can do," Lan said, flourishing her lightsaber in a Makashi salute, "Is set you free."

Lan charged, and Dooku ran to meet her.

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I just couldn't resist.

For those of you who don't know, Fay is an EU character who was introduced in the Clone Wars comics. Just look her up on Wookiepedia if you're interested.

I hope you enjoyed it, please review!


	3. Hatred

I got the idea to do this from Matt Stone and Trey Parker.

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**Hatred**

The life of Darth Vader was a pendulum that rocked back and forth between two versions of hell.

The first hell was life inside of his armor. The sensors in his helmet that provided him with sight made the world around him an angular, ugly thing that was always too bright even as it was robbed of its vibrancy. In a crowded room, the regulator of his audio sensors was swiftly overwhelmed by dozens, or even hundreds, of people talking at once, and Vader was constantly bombarded by the amplified fragments of scores of conversations at once.

And always, _always_, Vader was forced to listen to the sound of the respirator that helped his burned lungs and atrophied chest muscles breathe. Vader heard it first with his natural ears, muffled by his scarred eardrums and layers of armor. Then, no more than an instant later, he heard it again as his audio sensors detected the sound and fed it directly into Vader's auditory nerves. Vader's own breath was the staccato drumbeat that set the tempo of his agony.

The second hell was life outside of his armor. Vader was perpetually aware of the fact that he was encased in armor from head to toe. The constant feeling of claustrophobia had become so routine, so normal, that Vader was hardly even aware of it anymore. But on occasion, it would slip through his guard and drive him into a state of hyper-awareness until he was able to seek refuge in his meditation chamber, the only place he could survive removing his helmet.

But even here, Vader was denied relief. The scant amount of skin he could bare without dying was burned beyond feeling. Once free of his helmet, which trapped him in a deluge of sensory information, Vader was confronted with the opposite problem his sensors gave him. His corneas had been cooked by volcanic gasses, and he was so nearsighted that everything more than a centimeter away from his nose was a shapeless blur. His damaged ears made everything sound like he was listening to it from several meters away while underwater. Vader was technically capable of eating, but his charred mouth and tongue were no longer capable of detecting taste or texture, and so it was simpler to imbibe his nutrients intravenously.

The life of Darth Vader was a pendulum that rocked back and forth between two versions of hell, and the pendulum was made of hate.

Darth Vader hated himself.

Anakin Skywalker had been the most powerful Jedi who had ever existed. There had been no challenge that he could not overcome, no opponent he could not defeat. Anakin Skywalker had loved, and been loved in return. He had a great friend and mentor, whom he could trust wit his life. He had a wife who loved him, and even a child on the way. Anakin Skywalker had been a hero. Everywhere he went, citizens cheered his name. When a planet was threatened by an invading army, Anakin Skywalker was the first name the oppressed had called, and he had always answered.

Vader was none of these things.

Vader was weak. The power that had once been his was gone, torn away from him along with his limbs, scoured out of him by the heat of his burning flesh. Where once he had been a force of nature, now he was little more than a shadow. Even worse, Vader could still _feel_ his old strength within him, taunting him. Every time he reached for it, no matter how hard he tried, it always slipped away.

Vader was alone. His family was dead. His old master had crippled and abandoned him, and all of his old friends and peers were dust. Why could they not understand? Why had they prevented Vader from saving them? The entire galaxy could have been theirs. They could have achieved true peace. But in their ignorance they had both turned from him, and destroyed him. Now there would never be peace.

Vader was a monster. Where once he had been the galaxy's champion, now he was its bane. People of all species quailed in his presence, and they only spoke his name in whispers, as if even the thought of him would bring ruin down upon them.

Vader hated his enemies.

He hated the rebels and the rogue Jedi who forced him to chase them around the galaxy. They were the excuse that his master used to keep him away, to stop him from regaining his strength. If Vader was ever to become the most powerful man in the galaxy once more, there were many more lessons he would need to extract from his master. But Palpatine was wily. He knew that Vader wanted his throne, and only rarely did he offer some new teaching to increase Vader's power.

Vader hated the Emperor most of all.

Palpatine had taken everything away from him. Where once Vader had been whole, now he was a cripple. Where once he had been happy, now he was in a state of perpetual rage. Palpatine had lifted him up, and then sent him crashing down, shattering him beyond recognition. And instead of doing the merciful thing, the human thing, and simply letting Vader die, Palpatine had refused to let him go. The Emperor had taken the few remaining pieces of Vader and encased them in his black armor; forcing Vader to continue living, if only to serve him. Sometimes Vader hated the Emperor so much he thought he would explode with the force of it.

Darth Vader swore by the cursed black shell that kept him alive that the Emperor _would_ fall.

He would have his revenge.

Soon.

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I hope you enjoyed it.  Please review!


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